We can’t get to the future in a gas-powered car; it will take us over the edge first. We need something fundamentally different from Fiat to get us there.

The Fiat World

The world is ruled by fiat (i.e., because I say so). The Fiat world we live in has worked in the sense that it has made things better for the “advanced” countries, but it can never be just.

Trying to fix the Fiat model is like trying to get a gas car to consume less. You can make the car more efficient, or even make it a gas-electric hybrid, but it will always be a gasoline fueled car. No gas, no work.

The Radical model is more like the all-electric car. Same look as a car, but it is fundamentally different. No gas, no problem.

The Fiat path will take us over the edge. A Radical system will take us to a more sustainable future.^∇

Based on Extraction

The Fiat world is based on extraction,

• My wellbeing is extracted from everybody else’s wellbeing (servitude).
• My wellbeing is determined by my (financial) wealth and my wealth is extracted from everybody else’s wealth (enclosure).
• My wealth is grown by everybody else’s labor (exploitation).

The injustice, and oftentimes horror, that this system engenders is actually pretty predictable,

• It feeds on enclosures. What used to be for the use by the community is now for the exclusive use of the brute who moved all others out by force. These days that is government’s work.
• The “force” can be minimal and pass unnoticed, but it is force nevertheless.
• People are divided by what has come to be known as classes.
• Classes struggle against each other and sometimes it ends up in bloody revolutions.
• All of these sacrifices end up ushering a new set of bosses, but the Fiat stays in place.
• At one end, it results in an absolute “leader” who aims to stay forever.
• At the other end, it ends up with elected “leaders.”, that nevertheless by rule by fiat.
• In both cases, big money calls the shots and the Fiat hierarchy remains. We may get a new dictator or not get reelected, but Fiat stays.
• Servitude, enclosure, and exploitation continue unabated.
• The Fiat system has the side-effect of destroying our life support system.

This may be disagreeable, scary, or whatnot, but it is actually rational in the Fiat space. We need Radical-based communities if we want to survive.

Centralization

The “bad guy” is not the capital system and not government. The bad guy is centralized ownership.

Radical Co-Ownership

The most important thing for our long-term survival is to decentralize ownership. And not for a few lucky people, but for everyone. I am not talking about tweaking a gas car, but creating an all-electric car. We call hat co-ownership.

Maybe this was not possible earlier, but it is certainly possible now. We can distribute ownership without having a boss decide what to give, to whom. Today we can have every co-owner recognize your contributions and, from that, determine your co-ownership.

ENDNOTES

• I know I am being simplistic here, but it is basically right and it is memorable.